Have Covid Travel Requirements Gone Away?

At the end of 2022, in the Daily Sceptic, I published the first survey of which countries still required COVID-19 vaccines for entry. There followed two updates in January and April of 2023. Finally, with the conclusion that we were ‘nearly there’ I published the last in the series in May 2023.

As we embark on 2025, and now that Covid is all over bar the shouting – and the inquiries, the backlog of NHS appointments, the vaccine harmed and sectors of the economy that may never recover – I thought it might be worthwhile checking to see if any of the countries that maintained Covid vaccine requirements in the middle of 2023 were still doing so.

I am pleased to say that the outcome is very positive with very few countries even mentioning Covid vaccines in their entry requirements. There is the usual range of countries which maintain Yellow Fever vaccinations and the Marshall Islands and the Solomon Islands have requirements regarding MMR or measles vaccination. The former says: “To enter the Marshall Islands, you must show proof children aged four and under have had the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine”; and the latter says: “You must have a certificate to prove you’ve had a measles vaccination if you’re travelling from Australia, New Zealand, American Samoa, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga, Kiribati, Papua New Guinea or the Philippines (excluding transit passengers).”

Mozambique says: “There are no COVID-19 testing or vaccination requirements for travellers entering Mozambique”; while Palau, strangely, says: “There are no COVID-19 testing or vaccination requirements for travellers entering Palau, although the entry form will ask whether you are vaccinated.”

Myanmar says: “Travellers will be expected to complete a short health declaration in relation to the mpox [monkeypox] virus on arrival.” If anyone is brave enough to go to Myanmar he is unlikely, if asked, to affirm that he has mpox just as nobody in the history of air travel has ever responded ‘Yes’ to the question “Are you carrying any packages for anyone?” or said ‘No’ to the question “Did you pack your bags yourself?” In any case, as a recent article in the New Humanitarian suggests, the Myanmar junta may have more important things to think about than mpox.

So, Covid vaccine related travel restrictions are largely a thing of the past. But there is always one joker in every pack. And the joker in relation to Covid vaccine related travel restrictions is Turkmenistan, which says: “While Turkmenistan doesn’t require COVID-19 vaccination, all travellers must undergo a COVID-19 test upon arrival, which costs about 31 US dollars.”

It is hard to figure out why any country would still be requiring a Covid test for entry, but it probably boils down to someone in the Turkmenistan equivalent of the NHS over-ordering Covid tests. Described by Wikipedia as a country “widely criticised for its poor human rights, including for its treatment of minorities, and its lack of press and religious freedoms” it is also hard to imagine that too many people will be queuing up at the Turkmenistan border to shell out $31 for a Covid test.

Dr. Roger Watson is Professor of Nursing at Saint Francis University, Hong Kong SAR, China. He has a PhD in biochemistry. He writes in a personal capacity.

Subscribe
Notify of

To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.

Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.

9 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Jabby Mcstiff
Jabby Mcstiff
1 year ago

There is a lot of inertia in the state.

huxleypiggles
1 year ago

Climate and Nature Bill latest (bbc):

“The government won a motion, by 120 votes to seven, to end debate of the bill, meaning it will not return to the House of Commons until July and is unlikely to become law.”

Hardliner
1 year ago
Reply to  huxleypiggles

What did all the LibDem robots do? Go home to be recharged?

Jonathan M
Jonathan M
1 year ago
Reply to  huxleypiggles

Some good news at last!

Jabby Mcstiff
Jabby Mcstiff
1 year ago

Think of the human being as a big squashy lump of meat and then all of those AI tools sticking their probes in and weighing it up. Trust me the techno way is the way to death. The binary, the digital – this is a force that is much older than humanity. It can be called Ahriman. The tyranny of numbers, man’s reliance on the materium and the havoc it wreaks. You must stop this tendency in your own life and on every level. You don’t need me to tell you what will happen if you don’t.

kev
kev
1 year ago
Reply to  Jabby Mcstiff

Overdue another Carrington event, that will end the Digital Era, apart from a few hardened DC’s.

Unfortunately, it will also end virtually all modes of travel (except bicycles and Shanks’s pony”, electricity, water supply, communications, internet, heating, food production, medicines and pretty much all of 21st Century living.

But through Not Zero, CAN and other insane rules that will be our future anyway, unless we remove the lunatics from power.

So, I’m not so much wishing for it, but it is way overdue as a natural and unavoidable natural event.

Jabby Mcstiff
Jabby Mcstiff
1 year ago

They have you more weighed up than ever. Carry on if you like see where it leads you.

Art Simtotic
1 year ago

No doubt reinstated Australian physician, Dr William Bay, has an opinion…

https://hartuk.substack.com/p/the-vindication-of-william-bay

“…Australia was one of the most authoritarian countries in the world from 2020 onward. This week, however, we can celebrate a victory that reflects what Australians used to epitomize – no-nonsense courage and jovial determination.”

Top-class two minute clip of Man Himself at the Australian Medical Association meeting in 2022:

https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/you-have-been-warned-doctor-antivax-protest-leader-facing-suspension-over-bizarre-rant-to-chief-medical-officer/news-story/7302416443ef1844e32aa1903ac7fd2d

transmissionofflame
1 year ago

Thanks for the reminder. I remember when I could count on the fingers of one hand the countries that were open to me as an unvaccinated, untested person.

I expect if the “covid tests” restarted they’d find as much “covid” as there was in its “heyday”, including lots of “died WITH covid”. So really according to their logic, all these restrictions should still be in place and world governments are all granny killers.